As interest in women's rugby continues to surge, a new competition in Narrabri is offering girls in the surrounding area the chance to experience the sport.
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The Narrabri Pearl 7s kicked-off last Friday.
Aimed at high school students, the two-week mini-comp is designed as a bit of a taster with the vision of staging a longer competition next year.
Blue Boars women's star, and Narrabri High teacher Daisy Robinson has been one of the driving forces behind the competition, which is the first all-girls rugby 7s competition to be offered in the zone.
"We've had a lot of interest from girls at Narrabri High and we haven't had that many opportunities for them to play," Robinson explained.
"I just wanted to give them an opportunity to give it a go."
"I was also talking to Garry Walsh (NSW Rugby Development Manager North West NSW) earlier in the year and he had an idea of doing a Friday night comp for this area."
She suggested before they do that they run a bit of a come-and-try competition.
Run in conjunction between the Narrabri junior and senior clubs, Narrabri High and NSW Rugby, Robinson was "stoked" with how the first week went.
"We had quite a few girls there, which was great," she said.
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Sixty players from Narrabri, Coonabarabran, Gunnnedah and Warialda laced up the boots, the response admittedly exceeding her expectations with the prospect of more for this Friday's second session.
"We've got a couple of girls who saw last week and asked to play," Robinson said.
It's a reflection of the explosion in popularity of the sport among young girls following the Aussie women's gold medal triumph in Rio.
"Because there's so much in the media about women's sevens, they're seeing it and wanting to get involved," she said.
Her own journey hasn't been immune from that, the Olympics sparking a renewed interest in a sport she "played twice in high school and never wanted to play again".
"I didn't like it at all," Robinson admitted, adding that she "didn't really think much about it".
But with all the hype around the Olympics she "started to get interested again" and when the Blue Boars started up a women's side she decided to strap on the boots.
Robinson, who recently dabbled in a bit of rugby league nines with Boggabri, has been a prominent figure for them over the past two seasons and was for the just-completed season named the representative player of the year for the whole club.
